Crow Wing County Child Protection Team and the Leech Lake Manidoo Ningadoodem (Family Spirit) Program were among the award winners for work done with child abuse prevention.
FamilyWise Services, an agency for child abuse prevention and the home of Prevent Child Abuse Minnesota following its 2020 merger with Minnesota Communities Caring for Children, announced its “2021 Pinwheel for Prevention Award Winners” in a news release. The agency shares resources with partners, expands access to services and balances conditions for positive childhood experiences to enrich every community and support parents and caregivers.
April is national Child Abuse Prevention Month and this is the second year agencies have worked helping with prevention measures during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“We are adapting to and working to understand the new landscape that the pandemic has created and its repercussions for child abuse and neglect prevention,” the news release stated. “The risk to our nation’s children for experiencing child abuse and neglect in times of extreme stress and uncertainty is quite high. COVID-19 has added stressors to the lives of parents and caregivers, such as loss of employment, loss of income due to lack of paid leave, school and business closings that necessitate new childcare and homeschool arrangements, and food insecurity.”
“FamilyWise is dedicated to supporting parents and caregivers in building thriving families and creating fertile environments for healthy childhoods through parent education, wraparound services and early childhood education,” Ann Gaasch, FamilyWise services executive director, stated in a news release. “We do this work in collaboration with a statewide network of committed partners who have provided essential services, assisting families during the isolation and stress of the pandemic. The Pinwheel for Prevention awards are an annual recognition for our partners across Minnesota to honor the important work they do for families in our communities.”
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The Crow Wing County Child Protection Team was given the award for taking the lead on the annual Brainerd Radiothon to End Child Abuse, answering pledge lines for over 11 hours, entering nearly 400 pledges into a new online pledge system and ultimately helping to raise awareness and funds for child abuse prevention efforts.
The Leech Lake Manidoo Ningadoodem (Family Spirit) Program was given the award for delivering the largest, most rigorous, and only evidence-based home-visiting program designed specifically for Native American families. It is used to support new parents in a culturally-affirming way. The program is intentionally delivered by Native American paraprofessionals as a core strategy to support young, Native parents from pregnancy to three years post-partum.
